Five hundred forty-four law-enforcement agencies are sharing more than $3.5 million to purchase or replace bulletproof vests for their officers, the state Department of Law & Public Safety announced today.

Funds come from the state’s Body Armor Replacement Fund, which the Legislature created in 1998. It gets its funding through a $1 surcharge on traffic tickets and bail forfeitures. In its 13 years, the program has distributed more than $45 million.

Last year, spending for the program was slashed to $1.3 million due to the state’s budget deficit. While the spending is returning to near-normal levels, it isn’t quite back to where it had been. Not counting last year’s drastic reduction, this year’s $3,513,558 is the lowest spending since 1999.

The largest grants were $491,086 to the state Department of Corrections and $237,751 to the New Jersey State Police. Most of the grants were significantly smaller — only 59 of the 544 were for more than $10,000, and 24 were for less than $1,000.